


Teamwork

by caloriebomb



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Belly Kink, College Football, Eating, Feeding Kink, M/M, Situational Humiliation, Verbal Humiliation, Weight Gain, chubby bucky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 17:59:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13253625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caloriebomb/pseuds/caloriebomb
Summary: When a busted shoulder ends Bucky's college football career he replaces football with food, and his resentment of the replacement quarterback turns into something decidedly different.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> New year, new filth. Warnings for most weight gain-related scenarios, like public teasing/humiliation, fetishization of being out of shape, etc. 
> 
> I KNOW NOTHING, REPEAT, NOTHING ABOUT FOOTBALL. I had to google around a lot to find the word "playoffs" and I'm not even sure I'm using it right. This story comes off a prompt from tumblr user superstringtheory - if you read this, please forgive my total ignorance of all things sport!
> 
> And I feel like this one is even lower on plot than normal, and I didn't even really write any sex, so if you've come for anything other than excessive eating and many synonyms for "fat," seek thy treasure elsewhere. 
> 
> <3 <3 <3 Thank you for reading I'm sorry!

A chihuahua ended Bucky's football career forever. 

The accident was so stupid that he nearly went blind from frustration if he thought about it for too long, if he sat around dwelling on all the little moments leading up to the car crash that had ruined his left shoulder. If he'd hit the brakes a second sooner; if he hadn't been fiddling with the radio; if he hadn't eaten so much for lunch, if he hadn't been so sleepy, if it hadn't been so bright out, if he'd seen the dog a half-second earlier, if he'd just hit the damn animal instead of swerving to avoid it, if that truck hadn't run a red light, if he'd taken the back roads, if he'd never gone out for tacos in the first place... It was an endless series of could-have-beens that drove him crazy in the wee hours of the morning, when the loop of his mind kept him up and no amount of beer or hot chocolate or buttered toast could sate him into sleep. 

He was lucky, is what everyone told him. T-boned by a semi at 22 and he lived the tell the tale. So what if he'd never get his arm over his head again? So what if he'd set off metal detectors for the rest of his life, so what if the only goddamn thing he'd ever been good at was impossible anymore? So fucking what. He was alive and that's what mattered. He was lucky. 

So was the chihuahua, incidentally. She got off without a scrape on her, and Bucky'd gotten a thank-you card from her owner along with a hundred-dollar gift certificate to Ichabod's Ice Cream, which Bucky had blown through in about a week. The thank-you card was now displayed in place of pride on the vast steel refrigerator in the kitchen of Marvel University's Football House, where Bucky had lived for all three years of college. And, thanks to the vigorous campaigning of his fellow teammates, would continue to live through his senior year, despite his non-player status.

“You are still a part of this team,” boomed Thor, the team captain, at a party the Avengers threw for Bucky in the first week of the fall semester. “Once an Avenger, always an Avenger! HEAR HEAR!” And he chugged a stein of beer and then smashed it on the ground, to the whoops and applause of onlookers. Thor was partial to dramatic displays, though his theatrics were often mitigated by his sense of duty – moments after he'd drained and smashed the beer, he was decorously sweeping up the shards of glass and asking Sam to go and fetch a mop. 

It was two and half months after the accident, which had happened in mid-June, and Bucky was a hell of a lot more mobile than he'd been for most of the summer – but that wasn't saying much, considering he'd spent half that time in the hospital, and the other half in his best friend Natasha's basement, eating a frankly obscene amount of Doritos, re-learning how to play Halo one-handed, and gaining the 10 pounds that he was currently hiding under a baggy Avengers t-shirt.

It was force of habit more than anything else that kept him pinned to the couch for the whole party, letting people come to him instead of bouncing around as he normally did, and he found that underneath his bitterness he kind of enjoyed it – holding court like a duke, people clustering and clamoring to sit closest to him, bringing him beer after beer and plate after plate of snacks, until he was so drunk and stuffed he barely minded that his shoulder was aching distantly. 

“Don't you think you've had enough?” Natasha said, intercepting a beer being handed to him by a flutter-eyed blonde freshman girl. She took a sip herself and sank next to him on the couch, cuddling close, mindful of his bad shoulder. The freshman girl pouted and melted back into the bar. 

“Gimme that,” said Bucky. He stole the beer back and took a long gulp, then chased it with a handful of potato chips. To annoy Natasha – and because honestly his stomach was protesting the vast amount of liquid and salt he'd put into it tonight – he let out a long belch, then took another swig of beer.

“You can't drink your way through the rest of the year, James,” Nat said. 

“Why not?” Bucky said, barely slurring his words at all. “Pass me one'a those little hot dogs.”

Resignedly, she passed him the plate of pigs in a blanket and watched as he shoved a few in his mouth, washing them down with more beer. “You're being gross on purpose,” she said.

“If you're gonna nag me, I might as well give you a good reason,” he said. 

“Have you talked to the new QB yet?” Nat said. “He's been watching you all night. I think he's scared of you.”

Bucky's slightly out-of-focus eyes swung to the corner where the new quarterback was clanking bottles with Thor, and huh, Nat was right – his replacement was peering at Bucky over his beer, but as soon as Bucky glanced over at him, he quickly looked away, shoulders hunching slightly as if he were nervous. 

“Yeah, well,” Bucky said darkly. “He should be scared'a me. I fuckin' hate him, Nat. He's... I should be... Lookit his big dumb face. Transferred from fucking Deece U, of all fuckin' places. Last thing we need's another giant blond all-American hero type. Fuckin' hate him.”

“He's from Brooklyn too,” said Nat, and that threw Bucky a little, though only for a split-second. 

“I don't care where he's from,” Bucky said, and shouted suddenly, “Clint! Beer me!”

Clint saluted, and a minute later a beer was flying unerringly across the crowded room and into Bucky's waiting hand, to mingled gasps of alarm and shrieks of delight. It was a trick they'd always had, a perfect toss-and-catch of pure trust that never failed, even now with one of Bucky's arms out of commission, and it couldn't help but warm his heart a little. 

The new QB – Steve, his name was Steve – had watched the throw, and when Bucky caught it his stupid face was suddenly split with a surprised smile. He didn't look half so dumb, when he smiled. His disgustingly excellent cheekbones and despicably perfect jawline were still on full display, but he looked less unforgivably handsome, somehow – looked like a person you could tease a little, looked like someone who could maybe give as good as they got. 

“Hate 'im,” Bucky muttered, and opened his beer. 

“Well, get used to him,” Nat said. “Because guess what: he's not just the new QB. He's an art major, too.”

“What,” Bucky groaned. Nat was a painter, and he'd grown used to spending quiet time with her in the art department, breathing in the chemical smell of gesso and turpentine while she worked on her canvases and he studied. It was his refuge, the one place where he wasn't a football star, wasn't 'one of the boys,' wasn't an athlete – was just Bucky.

But he wasn't any of those things anymore, anyway. For the rest of his life, he'd be just Bucky. Right now, drunk off his ass, stuffed to the gills with an entire kitchen's worth of junk food, stomach uncomfortably bloated and shoulder throbbing steadily, he wasn't sure who that was. 

From across the room, the new QB was still watching him. When Bucky met his eyes, defiant, Steve raised a tentative bottle to him, and after a moment, Bucky resignedly raised his own beer back. In tandem, through the crowded room, they drank. 

“No one can replace you,” Natasha said quietly. 

“Sure,” said Bucky, drinking. “I know.”

:::

“We replaced you,” Thor said, a week or so later. “From now on, Steven will do the shopping.”

“What?” said Bucky, looking up from the groove he was wearing in the couch cushion. “Why?”

“Because all you buy is beer and frozen pizza,” said Sam, folding his arms. “Bad frozen pizza, with the doughy crust and not enough sauce and way too much pepperoni. Bruce is a fucking vegetarian, man. He needs, like, greek yogurt and tempeh. And I need some vegetables before I permanently damage my colon.”

“I bought chips,” Bucky said weakly.

“We see that,” said Thor, and leaned down to steal a handful from the bowl nestled in Bucky's lap. “We also see that you have availed yourself of Taco Bell, alone.”

Sam held up an empty Taco Bell bag and shook it menacincly. “Whatever happened to teamwork, man?”

“Steven worked at the cafeteria in his last university,” said Thor. “He says he knows how to cook vast quantities of healthy food, suitable for young men of our appetites. Your new chore is Refrigerator.”

“Fine,” said Bucky, but only because he didn't really mind Refrigerator. First crack at all the leftovers. And his friends had a good point. He'd been slacking hard on the food shopping lately, too lazy (too depressed, said Nat in his head) to pay the kind of attention he used to. Time was he'd prided himself on making sure his teammates had a kitchen full of healthy, high-calorie, high-protein, well-balanced food, and he was suddenly ashamed of himself. He wasn't an athlete anymore... But they were. They needed energy, sustenance, and he'd failed. 

“Look,” he said, “if Steve doesn't work out, I'll take over again. I let it slide, and I'm real sorry about that. I wasn't... I'm still not completely... I...”

“Hold your apologies,” said Thor magnanimously. “You can apologize by including us in your next Taco Bell journey.”

“Deal,” said Bucky. 

:::

But they weren't awake that night at 2am when he started feeling peckish, despite the six-pack and frozen pepperoni pizza he'd eaten for dinner, by himself, while the rest of the team was training at the gym. He was wearing sweatpants in solidarity, did that count? (He'd been wearing sweatpants every day since school started, of course, but that was immaterial. Jeans were hard to do-up one-handed.)

He'd get the team tacos next time, Bucky reasoned, getting out of bed and shuffling his feet into his unlaced sneakers. He was already planning his order as he padded downstairs, a couple grilled stuffed burritos and a taco to take the edge off, and he headed to the kitchen to grab a beer to accompany him on the three-block walk. He was surprised to see the light on, and he stopped short in the doorway.

The new QB, Steve “Replacement” Rogers, was standing at the stove in low-slung flannel pants and not much else. He was humming to himself, stirring a giant pot that smelled mouthwateringly good, and he didn't hear Bucky's footsteps; didn't hear the sharp intake of breath that Bucky couldn't quite stifle in time, because holy jesus Rogers looked good. Bucky was no stranger to great bodies – he was best friends with Nat, for chrissake, and regularly saw Thor buck-ass naked – but Steve was something else. All golden and peach like a summer's day, broad shoulders that wouldn't quit and a waist Bucky could span with his hands, two dimples right above the waistband of his pajama pants and an ass so perfect Bucky didn't even want to slap it, he just wanted to rest his hands gently on it and feel the awesome power of God. Then maybe slap a little, too. 

The sheer objectification going on in his own brain made him blush. Aside from a brief you-do-me-I'll-do-you thing with Clint in sophomore year, Bucky was strict about keeping his team-life and his sex-life apart. He cleared his throat, loudly, and Steve whirled around. When he saw who was standing there he flushed, his big shoulders hunching in that funny way he had, like he could make himself smaller, and Bucky suddenly felt bad for how overtly hostile he'd been towards the guy. 

“That smells amazing,” Bucky said. “What've you got going on in there?”

“Mac and cheese,” said Steve.

“In that gigantic pot?” said Bucky, coming closer. “How many boxes did you use?”

“Oh,” said Steve, “No, it's – it's from scratch. I was gonna put it in the fridge, an easy grab-and-go lunch for the guys. I made chili, too, both meat and veggie, and pulled pork. And way too many brownies. If you want one, they're still warm.”

A minute later, Bucky was settled at the kitchen table, eating the most delicious brownie he'd ever had in his life. It was so good it almost distracted him from the perfection of humanity that was Steve Rogers' chest. 

“Steve,” he said thickly. “How did – where'd you learn to –” He stopped, choking a little on the bite he hadn't had room for, and Steve laughed, then crossed the kitchen to pour him a tall glass of milk. 

“Gotta have milk with brownies,” Steve said, setting it in front of Bucky. “I learned from my mom. She always made a bunch of food on Sundays, so we could eat it for the rest of the week. Do you...” He hesitated. “Are you hungry? I could make you a plate. A sneak peek, before the other guys demolish everything.”

Bucky ended up with a plate of food straight out of his wildest dreams. A pulled pork sandwich on a grilled bun, a bowl of chili fragrant with meat and spices, and a heaping serving of the creamiest, gooiest, most toe-curlingly delicious macaroni and cheese he'd ever had in his life. It tasted like heaven. It tasted like repentance. 

“I'm sorry if I've been a dick to you,” Bucky said, cradling the remains of his pulled-pork sandwich and not quite able to meet Steve's earnest blue eyes. “I'm, uh... It hasn't been the best year for me, and...”

“It's okay,” said Steve. “If I were in your place, I wouldn't like me much either.”

“Look, I might not be playing anymore, but...” Bucky took a comforting bite of mac and cheese, chewed, swallowed. “These guys are still my team, you know? And you're on that team now, so you're my team too. I'm sorry I haven't been treating you like a teammate.”

“Clearly it's my fault,” said Steve, and gestured to the smorgasbord he'd laid out. “If I'd known all it took was a sandwich...”

Bucky grinned. “I'm easy,” he said, and Steve ducked his head. 

“Let's split another brownie,” he said. “Like breaking bread. A... friendship treaty.”

“Pun intended?” said Bucky, and it took Steve a second, but when he got it he leaned his head back and laughed. It was almost as delicious as the brownie.

:::

“And that's how Steve Rogers became my new favorite person,” Bucky finished. 

Nat glanced at Steve across the painting studio, his headphones on, immersed in his canvas. “Maybe you can get him to open up a little,” she said. “I think he has a deep dark secret.”

Bucky peeled another brownie out of the wax paper Steve had wrapped them in that morning. “Yeah,” Bucky said. “Secretly he's Julia Child.”

“I mean, look at that painting,” Nat said. “It's technically perfect, and totally terrifying.”

Bucky squinted, appraising. It was a landscape, woodsy hills with a setting sun, quite stunning, actually – or was the sunset a forest fire? Were the hills a body? Was it a pyre? “Okay,” said Bucky. “I see what you mean.”

“You have chocolate on your nose,” said Nat, smiling a little. “What is that, your fifth brownie? You're still eating like a football player.”

It surprised him how much her words stung, and he put down his half-eaten brownie, appetite suddenly gone. Nat's face fell, her smile vanishing, and she said, “Oh, hey, Buck, no. You look great, you've always looked good with a little extra weight, I didn't mean...”

“No,” Bucky said, “it's not – I'm not worried about how I look. I just... I still think of myself as a player, you know? And it – I guess it's still jarring to hear you say I'm not.” 

“Football doesn't define you, Bucky,” she said. 

“Yeah?” he said. “Then what does?”

“Your loyalty,” she said. “Your compassion. Your – ”

“Nat, stop,” he said, squirming. “It's easy for you, anyway, you're an artist, you've always been an artist. What would you do if suddenly you couldn't paint anymore, huh?”

Nat bit her lip. “I don't know,” she said. “Probably eat a lot of brownies for a while.”

He laughed, then stopped, eyes narrowing. “And hey, what do you mean, a little extra weight?”

“Thought you weren't worried about how you look?” Nat teased.

“I'm not,” Bucky said grumpily, but he couldn't help from glancing over at Steve, body so obviously perfect even under a flannel shirt, jeans, and old painting apron. Now that he thought about it, he probably had put on some weight in addition to the 10 pounds he'd gained that summer – he'd been eating with no thought of calories or workouts, and he had noticed that his pants seemed less comfortable than usual. When he looked down he was surprised to see his stomach rounding out under his t-shirt, torso still firm with muscle but bloated, though that could be the brownie. He gave it an experimental pat. 

“If you'd worn anything other than sweatpants this semester, you might have noticed,” Nat said, smirking. 

“Good thing I look so cute in lounge wear.”

“That,” said Natasha, pointing at him, “Is a fact.”

:::

Now that she'd pointed it out, though, Bucky couldn't stop thinking about it. He sat through his Anthropology class with his bad hand resting in his lap, fingers curled up and touching that swell of belly that was suddenly poking out over the waistband of his sweats. He hadn't really been looking in the mirror much lately, just a cursory glance at his hair while he brushed his teeth, and he prodded his chin surreptitiously. Was it fleshier, too? He'd bought a bag of Doritos to get him through the hourlong period until lunch, but now he stared at them where they sat on his desk, full of artifically-flavored calories. He'd never worried about his body before – but before, he was working out all the time and didn't have to worry. 

He could work out now, he knew that – a bad arm was a sorry excuse, in the grand scheme of things... But he'd been playing football since he was 12 and the one bright side of the whole shitty situation was that he'd been sort of enjoying the forced change of pace. The downtime, the couchtime, the hanging out without a set of barbells between him and his friends... 

He shrugged his good shoulder and opened the bag of Doritos. It was pretty natural to put on a few pounds when you stopped playing sports, he knew that. It'd even out, soon enough. 

:::

“Natasha thinks you have a secret,” Bucky said to Steve a few weeks later.

“Oh yeah?” said Steve neutrally. It was a Sunday night, and they were in the kitchen for what had become their tradition. Steve made a batch of dishes for the week, and Bucky tried them out. Right now he was sitting pretty after putting away a plate of lasagna, a pile of potato salad, a bowl of creamy chicken chowder, and an enormous piece of chocolate cake. He'd had dinner at Nat's apartment earlier, a few plates of pasta and about half a loaf of garlic bread, plus a couple slices of apple pie and some ice cream, and he was feeling extravagently full, absolutely stuffed. 

He dragged his knuckles lazily over the bloat of his belly, feeling how his shirt had gotten tighter, pulling around the widening spread of his waist. He'd put on jeans for the first time in a while that morning – or, he'd tried. He'd found, not entirely to his surprise, that they didn't quite button unless he was flat on his back, a scant few centimeters of stomach in the way, and they were sinfully tight around his ass. He didn't think it was too noticeable from the outside, but he could definitely feel the extra pounds, though it wasn't really a bad sensation. He just felt kinda.... big. And sleepy, and a little bit uncomfortable with his belly packed so full, his sweatpants digging in a bit at his softening sides. He could feel the chair against the bare inch of lower back where his shirt had ridden up.

He'd weigh himself soon enough, see what the damage was. Then he'd make any decisions about diets or whatever, if he needed to. 

“She says she can see a secret in your paintings,” Bucky continued. 

Steve took his plate and ambled over to the counter, and Bucky watched as he cut another huge hunk of cake and plopped it down on the table. “Want more milk, too?” 

“Sure,” said Bucky, though he was working on a beer. “You're avoiding the question.”

“Everyone's got secrets,” said Steve. 

Bucky took a big bite of cake and chased it down with milk. Oof, he was full. “Is it about your mom?” he asked.

Steve looked surprised. “Why would you think that?”

“The way you talk about her,” Bucky said. “You talk about her, but – you don't, at the same time. I've wondered if...”

“She's dead,” said Steve, watching Bucky eat more cake. “When I was sixteen, of cancer. That's not a secret. I don't like to talk about it because, well, because it makes me pretty sad, but it's not a secret.”

Bucky's heart suddenly ached along with his shoulder and his overfull stomach, and he had an urge to grab Steve's hand. He grabbed his fork again, instead. “My parents are gone too,” Bucky said. “Car accident. I was little, seven. My great-aunt took me in, but she passed my freshman year.”

“Oh, Bucky,” said Steve. “I didn't know.” He sounded so sorrowful that Bucky almost laughed. 

“Maybe that's why we get along so well?” said Bucky. “'Cause we're a couple of sadsack orphans?”

“We get along because I'm a great cook,” said Steve. 

“That's not why,” said Bucky, almost offended. “Or, not entirely, anyway.”

“We get along because you love getting creamed in Portal 2,” Steve said. 

“We get along because you like having pals who're handsomer than you.”

“We get along because you like feeling short.”

“We get along because you like making me fat,” Bucky groaned, dropping his cake fork onto his now-empty plate. “Shit, Stevie, look at this.” He patted his full belly. “That's your fault, pal.”

Steve's face was suddenly a shocking shade of pink, but he only said mildly, “Pretty sure that's on you, Buck. I didn't force-feed you that bucket of fried chicken for lunch, or make you eat three waffles in the dining hall this morning. With bacon. And whipped cream.”

“God, I've eaten a lot today, when you put it like that,” Bucky said, mildly scandalized. And, for some reason... mildly aroused. “You didn't make me eat a bag of Lays, either.”

“No, I didn't.”

“Or drink that six pack. I should lay off the beer.”

“You probably should.”

Bucky hesitated, his heart pounding fast for some reason. “And if I ate another piece of chocolate cake,” he said. “That would be on me, too.”

“Yeah, it would,” said Steve. He was still completely pink, but his voice was as calm and measured as ever. 

“Would you, Stevie?” Bucky said, pushing his empty plate towards Steve, and for the third time Steve stood and cut a generous piece of cake, poured another glass of milk. Bucky didn't know what he was doing; didn't know why he suddenly felt compelled to pass from discomfort into pain, as he knew with certainty would happen if he kept eating. And sure enough, halfway into the slice he had to stop to catch his breath, stomach so packed his lungs barely had room to inflate. Steve said nothing, just watched him with those blue, blue eyes, and Bucky was caught between utter shame and utter, inexplicable arousal. Under the table, in his tightening sweatpants, his dick was getting hard. With every painful forkful he shoveled past his lips, his cock responded, so before he'd even finished the cake he had to focus on thinking about algebra and Professor Ryan's creepy hairy hands and the fact that he'd never play football again in order to calm himself down.

“Fuck, I'm full,” Bucky said, his fork dropping with a clatter. 

“You were full before you had that third piece of cake,” said Steve.

“I was full before I even had the first,” Bucky admitted. “Ugh. Jesus.” He ran his thumb around the waistband of his sweatpants, feeling the soft skin of his tight belly, the red lines caused by the elastic. He couldn't suck it in if he tried, his stomach pushed helplessly outward, rounding by the day, and Steve was right, it was no one's fault but Bucky's. The arousal started creeping back, and he shoved abruptly to his feet. 

“I need to go sleep this off,” he said. More like jerk it off. 

“Meet you for breakfast in the morning?” said Steve. Then he grinned, sharp and wicked. “It's cinnamon roll day.”


	2. Chapter 2

Steve did, in fact, have a secret, and it was so cliché, such a trope, that he was ashamed of himself for even concealing it in the first place. And it wasn't that he was necessarily hiding anything – he just wasn't, you know, not hiding. He wasn't out. What was the point of telling a house full of brawny football players that he was gay when he wasn't even dating anyone? If he started seeing somebody, well, then he'd come clean, because then he'd have a reason to – but otherwise, it was nobody's business whom he fantasized about in the privacy of his own thoughts. 

Especially when it was becoming more and more common for his fantasies to star one of said brawny football players. 

Brawny maybe wasn't quite the word for Bucky, anymore. He was still powerfully-built, sure, but... “thick” might be a more accurate description. Maybe even... “Chunky.”

And it was another one of Steve's secrets that “chunky” was exactly how he liked his men to be. Chunky, and getting chunkier. 

“Damn,” Sam said, watching Bucky put away his second cheeseburger in the dining hall. “You're definitely a member of the clean plate club.”

“Yup,” Bucky said, his attention still on his lunch, which wasn't finished, even after two cheeseburgers and a huge plate of waffle fries. He still had two pieces of pepperoni pizza and a little pile of onion rings, which he was now stacking on top of one slice, smothering in ranch dressing, and sandwiching between the second slice. 

His face had gotten noticeably pudgier in the three months Steve had known him, his cheeks puffing out adorably, his jawline softening into what was now, as he chewed strenuously, a flabby hint of a double chin, and he was packed into clothes that had probably fit him well last winter, and now clung to him like a second skin. Right now he was wearing a red henley that stretched over his broad, softening chest and did nothing to disguise the weight he was packing on in his belly, which was hidden from view by the table but was getting positively round, cresting over the tight waistband of sweatpants two sizes too small. He looked hot and uncomfortable, crammed too full into too tight clothing, and as Steve watched he finished his ridiculous pizza sandwich, puffed out a tired breath, and tried to pull his henley down where it was creeping up the chunky swell of his hips. 

And Steve was all a-fucking-bout it. He was so about it that he could barely stand to be here, in public, watching. He literally had to avert his eyes when Bucky said, “Gonna grab some dessert. Anyone?”

The rest of the table shook their heads, and Steve pretended to look out the window so he wouldn't have to watch Bucky climb to his feet, pushing himself up from the low chair, his belly brushing the edge of the table ever-so-slightly as he stood, his shirt riding up again and giving the world a clear view of just how tight his sweatpants were. They cut into the meat of his flank and hugged his chubby ass, which was starting to jiggle, just a little, as he walked. 

“Our fallen comrade is becoming stout,” Thor said comfortably, oblivious to Steve's agony. “He eats enough for three men!”

“Does he know?” Sam said. “Should we tell him?”

“How could he not know?” Thor said, wrinkling his vast brow. “He eats to fullness and beyond at every meal. His clothes are no longer adequate to contain his girth.”

“We should get that boy some new pants, at least,” Sam said. “Those are positively indecent.”

“He has a fine backside,” Thor declared. “Why should he hide it?”

Steve should go. He should get up and leave, right now, before Bucky came back with his dessert, which appeared to be a bowl of ice cream with two pieces of pie resting precariously atop it, and a couple cookies held loosely in his bad hand, and now it was too late because Bucky was sitting back down again, was putting an entire cookie into his mouth, was washing it down with chocolate milk, was taking an enormous bite of pie and ice cream, was pausing to wince and touch his belly and say, “Yikes, I'm getting full.”

“Gotta go,” Steve said, rocketing to his feet. “Late for class.”

But he didn't go to class. He went to the quietest bathroom in the art department, and he fisted himself desperately and came in under three minutes to the image of Bucky shoveling ice cream into his pretty pink mouth. 

::: 

A few nights later they were hanging out at Natasha's apartment for a pizza and movie night, and Bucky said casually, as they were discussing what to order, “I'll take a large meat-lovers. We should get wings, too.”

“What do you mean, you'll take a large?” Natasha said. “Are we at the point where we're eating entire pizzas by ourselves, now?”

Bucky was sprawled out on the couch with a beer, looking particularly chunky with an inch or two of gorgeous, fuzzy belly poking out from underneath his shirt. He looked at her and raised a lazy eyebrow. “I don't know about we,” he said. “But I'm hungry.”

She didn't comment further, just put in the order for two large pizzas and some wings, plus some cheesy breadsticks when Bucky asked for them, and she didn't say anything when he disappeared into the kitchen and came back with another beer and one of the cupcakes Steve had baked for Sam's birthday earlier that week. He settled himself back onto the couch with a contented little wriggle that went straight to Steve's groin – it was the wriggle of somebody trying to get comfortable under an unfamiliarly round belly, arching his back, settling his tummy more comfortably over his chunky hips, and his shirt slid up even further, so Steve could see what looked like a series of slender red stretchmarks stretching across the new lower curve of his stomach. 

When the pizza came they put on a movie, though Steve only had eyes for Bucky. Bucky, who shamelessly propped the entire pizza box on his lap and then proceeded to slowly and steadily eat the whole thing, grease shining on his lips in the flickering television light. Bucky, who finished the pizza and started in on the wings, filling a bowl with chicken bones and then hiccupping his way through most of the bread sticks. By the time the movie was over and Nat flicked on a light, Bucky was looking even chunkier than ever, his brow misted with sweat, his beautiful lips slick, an expression of pure discomfort on his face as he shifted around, again trying to arrange himself beneath his stomach, which had bloated out fuller than before. 

He sighed that particular sigh he did when he was too full to breathe comfortably, halfway between a wheeze and a gasp, and said to Natasha, who was openly staring, “I know, I know. I've put on weight. Freshman fifteen had to hit me sometime, though, right?”

“Try senior forty,” said Nat. 

“No way,” said Bucky, then looked uncertain. He did that little sigh again and put a protective hand on the crest of his belly, where it was starting to really mound up beneath his pecs. He snuck a sidelong glance at Steve, like he was waiting for his reaction. “You think I've gained that much?”

“You look good,” Steve said quickly. 

“You always look good,” Natasha said. “But you'd look even better if you got some clothes that actually fit.”

“I'm gonna lose it,” Bucky said. “Over Christmas break, I've got the whole month of January.”

“Nobody loses weight over Christmas,” Natasha said. “Just give in and get some new pants, at least.”

“I don't know what size I am,” Bucky said doubtfully, sighing again and kneading his belly with a soothing hand. Steve's mouth watered at the sight of his fingers sinking into the doughy pudge that had gathered roundly there, but when Bucky noticed Steve looking, he quickly dropped his hand. “I'm going to lose it,” he said again. “I didn't exactly mean to get this fat.”

“You're not fat,” said Natasha. Then added, “Yet. Keep eating entire pizzas, however...”

“All right, all right,” said Bucky.

:::

But the very next night, he ordered an extra-pepperoni at midnight and ate it by himself while he and Steve were playing Halo. He kept looking at Steve while he ate, as if daring him to say anything, but of course Steve didn't.

“Nat was close,” Bucky said, licking grease from his fingers. “It's forty-six.”

“Forty-six what,” Steve said, trying not to sound like his head was about to explode.

“Pounds,” Bucky said, touching his bloated tummy with tender fingers. “I weighed myself this morning, and I've gained forty-six pounds since the accident. I ended the season last year at 190, now I'm 236. Isn't that fucking crazy?”

“When I was in high school, I put on nearly a hundred pounds in two years,” said Steve. “I mean, I grew five inches and most of it was muscle, but, you know. Bodies change.”

“I'm gonna lose it over Christmas break,” Bucky said again. “But I did order a couple pairs of new jeans. For meantime.”

“You should be comfortable,” Steve said fervently. 

“Yeah, well, I'm definitely not right now,” Bucky said, shifting with a groan. “These fucking sweatpants are cutting off my circulation. I didn't even know a person could outgrow sweatpants. All my boxers are too tight, too, so I had to get more of those, and I threw in a couple t-shirts. Getting fat is expensive.”

“Yeah,” said Steve. “That pizza was twenty bucks.”

Bucky laughed a little breathlessly. “The fucked up thing is, I could eat more. I'm full, definitely, but... I could eat. Is that insane?”

“No,” said Steve. “You should do what you want. God knows you've earned it.” He swallowed. “What can I get you?”

“Ice cream,” Bucky said immediately. “And another beer. Some whipped cream. Maybe some of that tapioca pudding, if there's any left.”

Steve's heart was pounding fit to burst as he loaded his arms with everything Bucky had requested. Already he was filing that request away in the most cherished drawer of his spank bank, eager for the moment later that night when he could take it out and polish it like the jewel it was. 

He ran into Thor on his way to the basement and nearly dropped his armful of dessert. The bowl of pudding would have been a floor of pudding if Thor hadn't reached out to steady it, and Steve valiantly fought a blush as Thor looked him up and down. 

“Hungry, quarterback?”

Steve didn't know what possessed him to tell the truth; maybe he just wanted to say it out loud. “It's for Barnes.”

Thor gave him a slow, wide grin. “No doubt it is. He always did have a weakness for... sweets.” And then he winked. “Be safe.”

He went up the steps to his room, whistling, and Steve stood there a moment longer, trying to process that interaction. Had Thor... Did Thor... Was that a blessing? It couldn't be. Could it? Steve's last team hadn't been homophobic, or not exactly, but they sure as hell stayed clear of questions about his sex life, once they'd figured out where his interests lay, and he'd always felt – other. Outside. Never quite one of the team. Here, though, the team was always making little comments that suggested they might not be nearly so closed-minded as the boys at Deece U had been. They talked about girls, sure, but they gossipped about boys, too, and had even spent a long morning that week dissecting what Clint swore up-and-down was a relationship between two History professors, both men. There had been no judgment to the discussion, everyone chiming in with evidence for or against Clint's claim, and Steve was beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, they wouldn't treat him differently if he came out. 

He wasn't quite ready to be proven wrong, however. Better it stay a secret, for now.

“Finally,” Bucky said, when Steve came trotting back down the stairs. “A guy could really work up an appetite, waiting for you.”

Feeling's mutual, Steve thought as he laid out Bucky's desserts. 

“Nat still thinks you have a secret,” Bucky said, starting in on the pint of ice cream, and Steve felt spookily as if he'd had his mind read. 

“You have a secret, too,” Steve said. “You put on 46 pounds in half a year.”

Bucky laughed. “Stevie, hate to break it to you, but I don't think it's much of a secret.”

Steve looked at Bucky's bloated belly and pudgy face, and swallowed. “Maybe not.”

“I'll tell you a secret, if you want,” Bucky said a moment later. He didn't look at Steve, just concentrated on squirting a pile of whipped cream onto his ice cream. “I never actually liked playing football.”

“What?” Steve said, genuinely shocked. 

“I liked stuff about it – I liked the team stuff, especially, and winning was always fun... But I never liked the workouts, or practices, or running around like a nut for no reason, no offense. I was always real good at it, and for a poor kid from Brooklyn – well, you get it. It was my ticket to college. I had to play. I don't think I realized how much I resented it until I couldn't play anymore. It hit me hard, at first, but... Honestly, I've come to grips with the fact that I'd rather sit around eating too much pizza every day than ever get back on the field. I don't really mind this extra weight. It's like a trade-off, almost.” He looked up at Steve with an almost bashful expression. “Is that crazy?”

“No,” Steve said simply. “I like football just fine, but I'd rather paint than practice any day. But they don't give a lot of scholarships for art.”

Bucky grinned at him. “Luckily you're good at both,” he said.

“I happen to know on good authority that you've got the highest GPA in the Engineering department,” Steve said. “So don't give me that shit.”

“Aw man, I told Nat to shut up about that,” Bucky said, but he looked pleased. Steve put the television on and tried not to stare while Bucky ate the entire pint of ice cream, a bowl of pudding, half a canister of whipped cream, and two more beers, then passed out in a sticky heap on the couch, clutching his belly with both hands, a furrow of discomfort etched between his brows. 

Steve covered him with a blanket, fetched him a glass of water and a bottle of Tums, and sat there for a while in silence, watching Bucky sleep. He could, he thought, watch Bucky sleep for a long, long time without getting bored, watch the way his pretty lips were slightly parted, his eyelashes shadowing his soft cheek, his little double chin begging to be kissed. 

Fuck.

Goddammit.

Steve was in love with his new best friend. 

:::

Bucky, Steve, and Sam were the only guys who stayed in the football house over their monthlong winter break, and Sam only stayed because his parents lived five blocks away and he was over there all the time anyway. Natasha flew to Italy to spend Christmas with her parents, who did some kind of vague diplomatic work for the Russian embassy that Steve was pretty sure meant they were spies, and the campus felt huge, snowy and deserted without the students. The house itself felt echoing and creepy without the team. 

The first morning of break, Steve padded downstairs to find Bucky making a very sad-looking breakfast of egg whites and orange slices. 

“Time to diet,” Bucky said grimly, like he was announcing war. “I'm going no-carb. That's what the internet said to do.”

“But you just got new pants,” Steve said.

Bucky looked down at his new jeans, buttoned comfortably under the curve of his belly, and said, “I got a few new sweaters, too. What do you think of this one?”

“It's great,” said Steve, which was a serious understatement. The blue wool sweater hugged Bucky's body in all the right places, emphasizing the glow of his eyes and his dark hair and the little swell of his muffintop. “Fits you perfect.”

“I think it'll look good when I lose this, too, though,” said Bucky, delivering a gentle pat to his middle, and Steve looked away. 

“Well,” he said. “I was going to make pancakes. But there's nothing sadder than eating pancakes alone.”

“Wish I could help you out,” said Bucky, his voice firm. “You want some egg whites?”

“No,” Steve said, trying not to let his heartbreak show in his voice. “Guess I'll have cereal.”

“Aw, Rogers, don't give me that sad face,” said Bucky. “Have your pancakes if you want 'em. I'll keep you company.”

It was okay, Steve thought, if Bucky lost the weight. It wouldn't change anything. They'd still be friends. Even eating egg whites, Bucky sat with him at the table and laughed at all his dumb jokes and poured him more coffee without being asked, and that wouldn't change. Only Bucky's body would change, his thick, broad, beautiful body, and that was fine, because he was Steve's friend, and friends didn't care what their friend's bodies looked like, right Rogers? Right?

But Steve needn't have worried. Two nights later, around 1am, he heard the doorbell, and when he went downstairs to investigate he found Bucky handing over a twenty to the Chinese delivery guy. When he saw Steve he flinched like he'd been caught red-handed, and said, “Goddammit Stevie. I'm just so fucking hungry.”

“Hey, I'm not here to judge you,” Steve said, so happy he could dance. “It's okay to break your diet now and then. It's healthy.”

What wasn't necessarily healthy was a six pack of beer, a whole carton of beef lo mein, a carton of mushu pork and a big stack of mushu pancakes, an order of crab rangoons, an order of egg rolls, an order of dumplings, and a king-size Snicker's bar to finish it off. 

“Maybe I should just cut out beer,” Bucky said muzzily, surveying the detritus of his late-night snack. He poked an empty bottle, then poked his bloated belly, and then let out a belch that seemed to surprise him. “Fuck, I'm full. Feels so good after a week of rabbit food.”

Steve didn't point out that it had actually only been about 48 hours of rabbit food. “Christmas is in two days,” he said. “Maybe you should just start your diet after the holiday. Sam's mom will be sad if you don't eat her food, you know? I heard she's a dynamite cook.”

“God, yeah, she is,” said Bucky, and set his jaw. “After Christmas, then,” he said. “That makes sense.”

Steve had never been to Sam's house before, but Bucky was apparently an old favorite, because he was swarmed with Sam's aunts (eight of them!) from the second he walked through the door, all of them fussing over his injury and expressing their sadness that he wasn't playing football and insisting on bringing him plate after plate of ham and casserole and turkey and pie and cake and cookies, all washed down with glasses of eggnog and bottles of heavy beer.

Meanwhile Sam's mother kept exclaiming things like, “You are really getting heavy, honey! Have another lemon bar,” and, “You truly have packed it on since last year, Bucky – have you tried the macaroni and cheese?”

“Your mom sends mixed messages,” Bucky said, laid up on the couch like a beached whale in his brand-new jeans and snug new sweater, his good shoulder pressed into Steve's. 

“She doesn't send messages,” Sam said, who seemed pretty full himself, picking idly at the remains of a piece of gingerbread. “She just issues statements, no judgment. Bucky, you're getting fat. Bucky, eat some ham. They're independent clauses. Got nothing to do with one another.”

“You think I'm getting fat?” Bucky said. 

Sam's mom chose that moment to bustle in with another thick mugful of eggnog for each of them, Bucky's piled high with whipped cream and nutmeg. 

“Bucky Barnes,” she said, shaking her head at him, “I just can't get over it. Look at that belly you've added! It'll be a real gut if you're not careful. Do you boys want me to bring in a plate of those sugar cookies?”

“Yes,” said Bucky firmly, and when she came back in, “I could eat these all day.”

“Looks like you do,” said Mrs. Wilson, and leaned to deliver a fond pat-pat to Bucky's tummy.

Steve's brain short-wired for a minute, and he was suddenly, overwhelmingly jealous of Mrs. Wilson's hand, lingering on the soft wool of Bucky's stretched sweater. 

“This is what happens to retired athletes, Mrs. Wilson,” said Bucky.

“I'd like to see Sam retire, then,” she said. “He's never been able to put on weight at all. Maybe you can give him some tips.”

“Eat cookies,” Bucky suggested, and Sam rolled his eyes. 

“That's a lot more than just cookies,” Sam said, and – Steve's vision tunneled – he delivered his own gentle pat to Bucky's stomach. 

“Definitely a few pizzas in there, too,” Bucky agreed, and nudged Steve. “Not to mention the delicious stuff this guy cooks up every week.”

“You like to cook?” Mrs. Wilson said to Steve, looking thrilled.

“Yes ma'am,” he said.

He left Christmas day with a big new stack of recipes to try, and only one person to try them out on. 

“Oh god,” Bucky said the next morning, flipping through the stack of recipes Mrs. Wilson had printed out. “Homemade ravioli. What the fuck? Who makes homemade ravioli?”

“Me,” Steve said, plucking the recipe from Bucky's hand. “Tonight.”

“I was thinking,” said Bucky. “It seems stupid to start a diet before New Year's. Why get a jump-start on a resolution, you know?”

He ate the entire double batch of hand-stuffed ravioli with cream and bacon, and half a pan of raspberry cream-cheese bars. The other half of the bars he ate for breakfast the next morning, along with a packet of bacon and a milkshake, which even for Bucky was really something.

“A chocolate milkshake for breakfast?” Steve said, impressed.

“Gotta get it out of my system before this diet starts,” Bucky explained, and let out a small burp. 

“May as well have another one, then,” Steve said, trying for ironic but ending up only at eager. 

“Two milkshakes before lunch,” Bucky said, and his eyes gleamed. “God. I'm gonna put Oreos in this one.”

Sam came in during milkshake number two, his eyes darting from Bucky's round tummy to the chocolate-sticky blender and the open pack of Oreos to Steve, but he said nothing. 

In the five days from Christmas until New Years, Bucky ate more than Steve would have thought possible. He ate from the second he woke up until the second he went to sleep, starting with pancakes or cheesy omelettes, grazing all morning on generous slices from the pies that Steve kept baking, the brownies, the cookies, the huge towering fudgy cheesecake, then an enormous takeout lunch of burritos or pizza or submarine sandwiches the size of his head, then chips through the afternoon, candied nuts, cheese and crackers, milkshakes and ice cream and pudding, and then endless helpings of whatever Steve cooked them for dinner: roast beef, mashed potatoes, alfredo, homemade bread, washed down with bottle after bottle of beer. 

He was literally always eating, his mouth always full. Steve went into his room to look for a book he'd borrowed and found an empty bag of Doritos on Bucky's pillow, an empty pint of ice cream on his nightstand. He went downstairs in the middle of the night for a glass of water and found Bucky perched at the kitchen table eating straight from a pie tin, in just boxers and a very old t-shirt that barely made it past his belly button. His thighs were getting so doughy, spread out across the chair, his ass getting wider and softer by the day, and to Steve's blissful amazement he saw that the lower bulge of Bucky's belly was touching the tops of his thighs, now, settled out over the waistband of his boxers and squished by Bucky's slouched position. 

“I'm not even hungry,” Bucky said, gesturing to the pie. “Just a black fucking hole, I guess. Trying to get the most out of my last days of freedom. Urrp. I'm actually really fucking full.”

“I can see that,” Steve said, because Bucky's belly was swollen and tight and he was sweating a little, breathing shallowly as he kept eating. 

“Ugh, jesus,” Bucky said. “I'm really starting to feel heavy. This thing is weighing me down.” He grabbed a handful of belly and shook it. There wasn't much jiggle, it was too full for that, but a quiver ran across his soft lower belly and his lovehandles trembled. His shirt was riding high over his pudgy hip, and Steve could see stretchmarks there, red and new. 

“You look good,” he said, which is all he ever said, but he meant it so sincerely that Bucky smiled. 

“I look big,” Bucky said. 

“Yeah,” said Steve, and swallowed. “Anyway. I'm gonna – good night. Enjoy the pie.”

“Oh, I will,” said Bucky. 

:::

New Year's came and went, and Bucky stopped eating like the apocalypse was coming – but he decidedly did not diet. He just slowed his roll a little, which wasn't much at all, comparatively, and after a few days he stopped even trying to pretend or make excuses. 

“It just seems barbaric to be so hungry and deprive myself,” Bucky said, his eyes big and pleading. “There are people starving out there, and I'm making a fuss about carbs?”

Steve had caught him at the diner near campus, having an early lunch of a double bacon cheeseburger, cheese fries, a bowl of chili, and pie a la mode. This just an hour after he'd nobly refused Steve's offer of muffins that morning, in favor of an unflavored bowl of oatmeal. 

“Buck, you should do whatever feels good,” said Steve, and sat across from him to steal a french fry. “Do you feel good?”

Bucky's mouth was full of burger. “Fee fu'in grea,” he managed. 

By the time winter break ended, Bucky was up another twelve pounds, which Steve knew because Bucky told him outright, casually undoing the button of his jeans after a big dinner of spaghetti and meatballs. 

“Guess those new twelve pounds put me up another size,” he said. “Should've bought two sizes up to begin with.”

Steve nearly choked on his beer. “Twelve pounds?”

“Probably more like thirteen, after that dinner,” Bucky said ruefully. “What, you can't tell?”

“I mean, you – I – yeah, I guess I can tell you've put on some more weight,” Steve said, and he could. Bucky was getting seriously chubby. His thighs rubbed together when he walked, now, and his belly was suddenly without a doubt his most prominent feature, unhideable even under the baggiest sweatshirts, a roundly squishable curve that led him around. His ass was starting to spill off the sides of their kitchen chairs, and his hips had a crease to them where his shirt kept hiking up, a roll of a spare tire that went all around to his pudgy lower back. 

Bucky rubbed one of his soft pecs idly, a new habit for him. “The team's gonna give me so much shit,” he said, and he sounded almost gleeful. 

And he was right.

“Barnes, you have grown large with the holiday season!” Thor boomed. “It is a festive look.”

“If by festive, you mean he looks like Santa,” Clint said. 

“Shut up,” Bucky said good-naturedly, scratching the side of his tummy. He was sitting on the couch, a few of the guys gathered around him, and Steve couldn't help but love the picture they made: a bunch of muscle-thick young men, all athletic and strong and trim, surrounding Bucky, whose belly was resting gently on his widening thighs, his pink cheeks getting a little chipmunky in their roundness, his hips rounding over his waistband. He looked like the very image of decadence and sweetness, and Steve had to excuse himself to his room. 

In the locker room the next morning, Bucky was the topic of conversation on everyone's lips, and Steve could barely stand it.

“He's blowing up,” said one guy. “Like the Michelin Man.”

“He is becoming soft, like his heart,” agreed Thor. 

“You like it, Clint?” teased someone else. “You been getting nostalgic for sophomore year?”

Steve looked sharply at Clint, who just grinned. “Can't say I mind it.”

“Gonna try and start something back up? It'd be like sleeping with a whole different dude.”

“Nah,” said Clint, and suddenly he was looking straight at Steve. “Can't revisit the past. I think Bucky's ready for something completely new.”

“Like Mrs. Claus,” said Sam, to gales of laughter. 

Steve, though, was too stunned to laugh. Had he heard what he thought he'd heard? Because it sure as hell sounded like Bucky and Clint had used to hook up – and it sounded like everyone knew about it, and didn't care. Just one more thing to tease about, nothing out of the ordinary, nothing to set them apart. 

And more importantly, more importantly by far, this meant... this meant... 

This meant Bucky liked men.


	3. Chapter 3

“Okay,” Natasha said, when she saw Bucky for the first time after the break, at the end of January. “What happened. Did you eat Steve?”

“Ha, ha,” Bucky said, and rested a careful hand on his belly. He found himself doing that more and more lately, because somewhere along the line, it had rounded out into a kind of shelf under his pecs. His shirts had started creasing up around the top curve, and he pulled his sweater down beneath Natasha's wide-eyed gaze. “This is mostly, like, milkshakes and spaghetti.”

“You said you were going to lose weight,” she said. 

“Well, I did the opposite.” He raised his chin, defiant. 

“How do you feel?” she wanted to know.

Unconsciously, his hand strayed to one of his pecs, which had been feeling oddly tender lately. He squeezed lightly. “Big,” he said. “Heavy. Kinda tired from walking over here.”

“Sit down, then,” she said, and he did, feeling even bigger than usual as he lowered himself onto her couch with an audible oof of breath, bending awkwardly over his belly as he bent his knees and then taking a moment to get himself comfortably settled under its weight, spreading his legs a bit, maybe making a little show of it because he was a sick bastard. He laid his hand across the top of it and waited. 

“Do you like it?” Nat said. 

“Would you think I'm crazy if I said I don't mind?”

“No.”

“Then, yeah, I don't mind. It's a little uncomfortable, like, nothing fits me and my belly gets in the way sometimes, but I don't... miss being thin. And I really, really like eating.”

“What does Steve think?”

Bucky turned beet red. “What does it matter what Steve thinks?”

Natasha rolled her eyes. “He still cooking for you all the time?”

“Yeah, the guy likes to cook, what about it? Ugh, just thinking about it makes me hungry. You got any snacks around here?” Bucky tried very hard to act like he wasn't changing the subject. 

Natasha vanished into the kitchen, then came back with two beers and an unopened box of Thin Mints. Bucky wasn't, in fact, hungry, considering he'd just had several heaping plates of food from the dining hall, but he opened the box anyway and started working his way through the rows of cookies. His belly gave a low gurgle, trying to accommodate the extra food, and Natasha raised her eyebrows.

“You really are hungry,” she said. “I can hear your stomach rumbling from over here.”

Bucky didn't want to admit the real cause of the sound, which was the exact opposite of hunger, so he nodded, and Natasha went back to the kitchen and reappeared with a couple slices of cold pizza wrapped in foil. Bucky smiled his thanks and unwrapped them, sighing a little as he began eating, his belly feeling so full and round and heavy that he had to rock around a bit to try and get comfortable. 

“What else did you do over break?” Nat said. “Besides eat.”

“That's about it,” Bucky said, shrugging. “Slept a lot. Played videogames. Read a couple books. Hung out with Steve. Urrrp. Scuse me. How about you?”

Nat told him about Italy while he ate, and then they watched a movie, and Bucky was surprised to find the box of Thin Mints was empty when the credits rolled, and the bowl of popcorn gone, and an entire package of double-stuff Oreos. He felt sticky and stuffed with sugar, disinclined to move, and he put his feet up on the couch and turned to the side a little, supporting his belly on the cushions while he caught his breath. 

“You just ate more cookies in two hours than I eat in two years,” Natasha said, sounding halfway between awed and amused. 

“I didn't put on sixty pounds by sticking to the serving size,” Bucky said, resting his bad arm across his swollen gut. It was actually kind of nice having a built-in armrest; his shoulder had been aching a lot less lately. 

“It's weird,” Nat said, “but you look... I don't know how to explain it, but you almost look more like yourself this way. The whole jock look never seemed to fit you. At least not to me.”

Bucky smiled at her, touched. “If we weren't friends,” he said, “I think I would have lost my shit a lot a lot worse than I did. When I couldn't play anymore, I mean. But having someone like you around, someone who doesn't really give a shit about sports... It helped.”

Natasha's face was completely impassive, which meant she was feeling something. “I think gaining sixty pounds in four months constitutes losing your shit.”

“I said it wouldn've been worse,” Bucky said, grinning. “I might've, I don't know, gotten really skinny, instead. You saved me from a life without Oreos.” Natasha looked deeply uncomfortable, now, which made Bucky laugh. She really didn't do feelings. “Anyway, you wanna come to the game with me this weekend? We can smoke up first so you don't get too bored.”

“Fine,” said Nat, and then ran her eyes across Bucky's prone form. “You bring the weed. I'll bring the snacks.”

:::

The football stadium was packed when Bucky and Nat filed in, both of them red-eyed and giggling, Bucky using his new bulk to push a path towards a pair of good seats. They settled in next to a cluster of heavily made-up girls with aggressively blond hair, all of whom stared openly at Bucky but seemed terrified of Nat.

Bucky grinned at them and got himself comfortable in the seat, which was a lot narrower than it had felt even a month ago, his legs pressed uncomfortably together, his ass squeezed between the armrests, his belly feeling squished by the combination of too-tight jeans, too-tight jacket, and the lap that his stomach had recently begun sitting on. He could feel the eyes of the girls, probably goggling over how much he'd let himself go, and for some reason the thought sent a jacknife of arousal straight to his groin. 

“I'm too fat for this seat,” he complained, loudly. 

“You are not,” Natasha said. “You've got another sixty pounds to go, for that.”

This, too, sent a twinge of pleasure to Bucky's dick, and he distracted himself by moving his shoulder, letting the thrum of pain replace the completely inexplicable horniness that had overtaken him. “Look,” he said, “there's Stevie!”

Steve was waving to them from the field, looking bright-eyed and golden and thrilled to see them, practically wagging his tail in pre-game excitement, and somewhere along the way, Bucky had stopped feeling any kind of envy or resentment when he watched Steve play his old position. It was impossible to feel anything negative about Steve at all. The only thing Bucky felt about Steve was positive – so overwhelmingly positive, in fact, that he couldn't think about it too much or his heart started going crazy. Bucky and Nat waved back, giggling in stoned tandem. 

“I have the munchies,” Bucky said. “What'd you bring me?”

With great ceremony, Natasha reached into her backpack and brought out a loaf of sliced bread. No, Bucky realized – it was sandwiches, a whole loaf of them, each of them apparently different, and his eyes lit up. She'd brought a big bag of Doritos, too, and a box of crackers with a block of cheddar cheese, and – bless her – a package of double-stuff Oreos. 

“Nat,” he said, opening the bag of sandwiches and pulling one out – roast beef, by the looks of it. “You are a goddess.”

“Think that'll tide you over til dinner?” she said. 

He was already eating. “Depends,” he said. “When's dinner?”

The game was tight, and thrilling – but even more thrilling for Bucky was thinking about what he must look like, surrounded by a steadily-diminishing stack of snacks, and he knew people were glancing at him, watching him as he ate one sandwich after another, roast beef and then turkey and then salami and then another roast beef, interspersed with huge handfuls of Doritos and chunks of cheddar cheese sandwiched between innumerable crackers, crumbs falling from his mouth onto the new slope of his belly, where he didn't brush them off, let them accumulate like evidence of his gluttony. He was stoned, and hungry, and he knew he was making a spectacle of himself, and god, it turned him right the fuck on. He'd had five sandwiches and eaten all the Doritos before he started really feeling full, and even then the weed took the edge off, and he managed another sandwich and about half the block of cheese before he started putting Oreos in his mouth, his jeans feeling tighter and tighter and his stomach beginning to gurgle unhappily. It was a familiar feeling, by now, a feeling he'd come to love, and by the time the game was over, there was nothing left of Natasha's snacks but the wrappers. 

When the Avengers won, everybody surged to their feet screaming and clapping, but Bucky couldn't get up, so full he was almost dizzy with it, his belly feeling impossibly tight and swollen, and he clapped weakly from his seat. Logically he knew he wasn't that big – even at 250 pounds he didn't think he could be called fat, just beer-bellied and thick – but he felt enormous just then, packed to the brim and knowing that he was going to go straight home, take a nap, then wake up and eat some more, no exercise but the walk back to the house. Why the hell did that turn him on so goddamn much? 

“Bucky, c'mon,” Nat said, interrupting his reverie, and to his surprise he noticed that most of the other seats had cleared out. She reached down and patted his belly where it was beginning to shelf beneath his pudgy pecs. “Do I have to carry you?”

“You couldn't,” he said. “I'm way too heavy.”

“I bet Steve could,” she said, and Bucky's mouth grew dry at the thought of Steve picking him, throwing him around a little. “Here he comes.”

Sure enough, Steve was bounding up the stadium steps, radiant with happiness from the win, and it was just about the only sight that could've gotten Bucky to his feet at that moment. He groaned himself upward just in time to be enveloped in a hug, his packed belly pressing against Steve's hard torso, a surprisingly pleasant feeling, like getting a bellyrub from a six-pack. Steve smelled wonderful, like a hard sweat on a green field. 

“You did so good, pal,” he said, patting Steve on his muscled back. 

“You're my good luck charm,” Steve said happily. “The only two games you've missed   
are the only two games I've lost. I knew as soon as I saw you in the stands that we were a shoe-in.”

“I have nothing to do with it,” Bucky said. “It's all you.”

“We're gonna head to the bar tonight, to celebrate,” Steve said. “You in?”

“Of course,” Bucky said. “I need a nap, first, but wake me up when you go?”

“Will do,” Steve said, and with another quick hug for both of them he was off. 

Bucky slept long and hard that afternoon, and woke disoriented to the sound of Steve banging on his bedroom door. 

“I'm up!” Bucky hollered, and the banging stopped as Steve politely withdrew. Bucky was glad he hadn't barged in, because he'd fallen asleep half-upright in his bed, his hand still down his sticky boxers, his jeans in a puddle on the floor. He grimaced and went to the sink to wash up, pausing when he caught sight of himself in the mirror. His boxers were getting too small again, and there were red stripes around his soft waist that mingled with the stretchmarks he was collecting, everything on full display because his sleep tee had rucked up over his belly and was gathered beneath his pecs, and when he pulled it down it settled inches from his boxers, his stomach still bloated from the game. His face looked puffy and swollen, his chin soft, his shoulders soft, everything getting soft, soft, soft. He brushed his teeth, belly pressed against the sink, and then tried to put his jeans back on but they felt so tight, so constricting, that he gave up and swapped them out for his sweatpants, layering a snug t-shirt and a flannel shirt that wouldn't button, his gut sticking out too far to even try. He ran his hands along it, then cupped one of his soft pecs and imagined it getting bigger, softer, rounder, like a little tit, and he felt his nipple harden. 

At the bar he ordered two full meals, a cheesburger basket and a chicken-fried steak, and he sat in the corner with his smorgasbord and ate everything slowly, with great relish, drinking the beers his teammates brought him and enjoying being the still center of a busy bar. 

“Watching you eat is like watching a pro athlete,” Sam said. “No wonder you don't miss football as much anymore. You found a new sport.”

“Aren't you full?” Clint wanted to know.

“Yep,” Bucky said, pausing to hiccup, then he ate a fistful of french fries.

Steve sat beside him, quiet and glowing, stealing sidelong glances as Bucky worked his way through the plates of food, and Bucky couldn't tell what those glances meant. He wasn't judging Bucky for eating so much, Bucky knew that by now, but neither did he have the same confused fascination as Bucky's teammates. It was something else. Something that made Bucky want to sit here stuffing his face in front of Steve for the rest of his goddamn life.

“Buck,” Clint said, swinging by to snag an onion ring. “You need another beer?”

“I'm good,” Bucky said, hoisting his glass. “Stevie's got me covered.”

“Holler if he slacks off,” Clint said, and patted Bucky affectionately on the cheek before he darted back into the crowd. Bucky was smiling to himself when he noticed Steve's suddenly serious, intent expression. 

“What?” Bucky said self-consciously. “Do I have something on my face?”

“Actually, yeah,” Steve said. “A little ketchup, right here. But... I was... Nevermind.”

“Spit it out,” Bucky said, concerned. “You okay?”

“I heard the guys talking the other day,” Steve said, and now he was blushing. “Did you and Clint ever... Um, did you...”

“We fooled around for a few months, sophomore year,” Bucky said, and felt suddenly cold despite the beer and his full stomach. “You got a problem with that?”

“With --” Steve looked confused, and then appalled. “Oh, Bucky, no! I have no problem with – with –”

“Homosexuals?” Bucky prompted.

“With anything,” Steve said firmly. “That'd be a little hypocritical of me. I was just wondering, about you and Clint, I mean.”

But Bucky barely heard the end of that sentence. “What do you mean, hypocritical?”

Steve was suddenly the color of a valentine. “Well, you know, I'm gay, so, um, I'm not in a position to judge anyone. That's all I meant.”

“You're gay?” Bucky didn't mean to say it so loudly, but several heads swiveled in their direction, and Steve made frantic shushing movements. 

“Jesus, Buck, wanna out me to the whole bar?”

“Sorry,” Bucky said, wincing, “Sorry, I just... I didn't know.”

“You don't... care, do you?”

“NO!” said Bucky, nearly yelling again, and then, because he didn't know what the fuck else to do, he shoved an enormous bite of steak into his mouth and almost choked. 

“Slow down,” Steve said, smiling a little. “Pretty sure it's not going anywhere.”

“Neither am I,” Bucky said, and for one second their eyes met, and he felt a tingle pass through his entire body, a surge of sudden certainty that Steve felt it too, that he wasn't alone in this, but then Steve looked away and Bucky's false confidence plummeted. 

“I'm gonna get us another round,” Steve said, and stood, though both their beers were barely half-empty. Bucky watched him go, his head spinning, his stomach groaning in protest as he finished off his chicken-fried steak and stacked his empty dishes. He sat back in the booth, tugging unhappily at the tight waistband of his sweatpants and thumbing the wide indent his stretched belly-button made in the tight fabric of his t-shirt, and then, after a moment's agonized indecision, he flagged down the waitress.

“Strawberry shortcake,” he said. “With ice cream.”

He was already sick over Steve; he may as well feel sick over a belly full of delicious dessert, too.


	4. Chapter 4

One morning in March, Steve opened the door of Bucky's room to find him sitting shirtless on his bed, peering down at an open textbook and eating from an open box of donuts. It was ten o'clock in the morning, and in the fresh clear light, Steve saw the perfect evidence of how much weight Bucky had put on since that first football game of the semester, about two and a half months ago now. He was propped up against his headboard, cross-legged with his belly settled plumply on thighs that were beginning to strain the hems of his boxers. He had a thick crease at his sides and a roll under his armpits, and his chin was nestled in his pudgy neck as he looked down at his textbook. He still had the remains of his football build – the wide shoulders, the strong arms – but everything was broader, rounder, softer. There were stretchmarks dazzled across his belly and on his back where his love handles had worked their way over the waistband of his shorts, and when he saw Steve he sat up a little, his double chin disappearing as he looked up. 

“Hey,” he said, hands moving a little as if he wanted to cover himself, before he gave up. “What's up?”

“Just, just came to see if you wanted to grab some brunch,” Steve stuttered, in a bit of a daze. Looking at Bucky's body was like looking directly into the sun. 

“Oh,” said Bucky, and glanced down at the donut he was holding, then pushed it into his mouth and spoke around it. “Sure. Lemme just put some clothes on. You can sit down and wait, if you want.”

Steve sat in Bucky's desk chair and watched as Bucky set aside his textbook, wiping his sugar-powdered hands on his bare belly and then swinging his legs over the side of his bed, pausing for a moment to examine the half-full box of donuts before he selected another one, and took a bite as he pushed himself to his feet and made his way, belly-first, over to his dresser. His round tummy was starting to droop just a bit, an inch or two of soft underbelly hanging over his waistband, and he chewed his donut as he contemplated his clothing before selecting a blue sweater and a pair of jeans. He finished the donut and then wrestled his way into the pants, huffing a little as he dragged them up over the gloriously chunky cheeks of his ass and his thick thighs, then arched his back to get his belly out of the way so he could button them – barely. Then the sweater, which framed his gut perfectly and showed off how wide it was getting. He sat on the bed to put on his shoes and socks, and Steve was in serious danger of passing out as he watched Bucky spread his legs to accommodate his stomach, leaning over and then coming up red-faced, pausing for breath before moving on to the next foot. 

“One for the road,” Bucky said, taking another donut, and Steve wondered what the odds of spontaneous combustion really were. 

They texted Nat on the way, and she met them at the local diner, covered in paint and looking a little crazed. 

“I haven't slept in two days,” she said, greeting Bucky with a firm slap to his ass. “James, did you get fatter since I saw you last?”

“Probably,” Bucky said, and lowered himself into the booth, the wool of his blue sweater straining across his belly button. He sat, arms at his sides, and stared down at his tummy, doming out impressively in front of him and mounded on his lap. “Swear to god these booths were smaller last Monday. Coffee milkshake, please.” 

This last was to the waitress, who had come to the table, pen poised over her notebook. 

“Two coffees,” Nat said, ordering for her and Steve.

“Can I get a piece of pecan pie, too?” Bucky said. “Thanks. Oh, and a large OJ.” He turned back to his friends, sighing. “Midterms make me so fucking hungry. I'm gonna hit 300 by summer, at this rate. I've put on twenty-five pounds since Christmas break, can you believe it?”

“You just ordered pie for breakfast,” Nat said. “I can believe it.”

Steve couldn't speak, was too busy doing mental math. “Twenty-five pounds,” he repeated distractedly. “So you're...”

“275,” Bucky said. “Thanks for rubbing it in. All my fucking clothes are tight, again.” He plucked disgustedly at his snug sweater and did a cute little wriggle of discomfort, but perked up as the waitress reappeared with his pie, juice and milkshake. 

Steve and Nat ordered omelettes, and Bucky, between bites of pie, ordered biscuits and gravy with fried eggs, bacon, ham, and sausage, plus a side of chorizo hash, and he glowered a little at Nat's incredulous look. 

“What,” he said, and slurped loudly on his milkshake. 

“You just ordered four different types of dead pig,” she said. 

“Okay, we've established that I'm a glutton,” he said. “Should we talk some more about how fat I'm getting? Is that gonna be our entire breakfast conversation?” He forked more pie into his mouth. “Because honestly, Nat, talking about it just makes me hungry.”

She raised her hands. “No judgment,” she said. “You know that. I'm just observing.”

Bucky finished his pie and took a long drink of his juice, then spooned up some milkshake. “Best part about not giving a fuck what I eat is not having to choose between all the delicious types of dead pig on the menu,” he said. “If there was porkchops, I'd have gotten that, too.”

“I bet you would've,” Nat said. “You are you what eat, after all...”

Bucky looked at Steve beseechingly. “She's being mean,” he said. 

“Nat, play nice,” Steve said half-heartedly. He was greatly enjoying this conversation, and had no actual desire for it to end. 

“This is me nice,” she said. “You don't want to see me mean.”

“I've seen you mean,” Bucky said. “Freshman year, when that Business Studies major asked you out.”

“I was wearing a sweatshirt that said Capitalism Can Blow Me,” Nat said. “He dug his own grave, there.”

By the time their breakfasts came, the topic had turned fully away from Bucky's food choices, and Nat pointedly ignored the plate heaped high with various meat products. Bucky ate steadily while Steve and Nat talked about their Art History midterm, quizzing each other on titles of paintings and dates of exhibitions, Bucky mostly quiet with concentration, though he got a bit noisier as his plate grew emptier. He started sighing after he'd finished most of the biscuits and gravy and the stack of pink ham, and by the time the bacon and sausage were gone and the eggs were a mere memory, he was burping behind his hand and sitting back every so often, looking dazed, one hand pressed gingerly into his overfull stomach. Before he started working in earnest on his plateful of oily chorizo hash, he ordered a Coke, and drank it very quickly before adding the cup to the growing collection of empty plates on his side of the table. Steve had trouble keeping his attention on the conversation as Bucky spent a few minutes working up some truly impressive belches, the Coke clearly doing its job, and then he finally pulled the plate of hash towards himself with an air of determination. 

“Mighta overdone it with the chorizo,” he said, hicupping and wincing. “I'm getting pretty full. Oof, god. Look at this thing, huh?” He patted the side of his belly, which was rising and falling with the rhythm of his shallow breath, looking even larger than it had when he'd sat down. “Fuck.”

“Definitely room for chorizo in there,” Steve said, and Bucky let out a breathless “Ha!”, but he attacked the chorizo with renewed determination. 

When he'd finished, when every one of his plates had been licked clean, Bucky sat slumped in the booth, pressing a fist into the side of his gut every so often and rustling up a long belch. “So fucking full,” he wheezed. “God. Shouldn't have had those donuts before breakfast.”

“Yeah,” Nat said. “Blame the donuts.”

Bucky burped, and sighed. “Fuck. You guys care if I...?” He trailed off, and gestured to his lap. When they stared at him, uncomprehending, he said, “Fuck it,” and lifted his belly out of the way so he could pop the top button of his jeans. “Ugh, that is so much better,” he moaned, as Steve's brain short-circuited from the hotness. 

“You gonna make it home?” Nat said.

“Lemme just sit here a minute,” Bucky said, his eyes fluttering closed. “Hrrrp. Hmm.”

“C'mon, Buck,” Steve said. “I'll get us an Uber. You can nap at home.”

“An Uber?” Bucky said, opening his eyes. “Really? It's only a ten minute walk.”

“Well, it's cold, and you're lazy,” Steve said. “My treat, as a thank-you for helping me with that problem set last night.”

“Steve,” Bucky said, all dimples, “You are a true blue pal.”

He fell asleep on one of the couches in the common room, sprawled out with an arm wrapped around his packed belly, his sweater rucked up enough that it was obvious he'd unbuttoned his pants. Steve sat in an armchair, ostensibly studying but really just watching Bucky sleep like the total pervert he was, and after a while Clint came through, did a double-take, then disappeared and returned with his phone. 

“I'm texting Sam's mom,” Clint said. “She'll want a picture of this. She keeps talking about how chubby Bucky looked over Christmas, and he's got to have packed on another twenty pounds at least, since then.”

“Another forty,” Steve supplied.

“Shit, are you kidding me?” Clint said. “In three and a half months? I guess it's no surprise, the way he eats. What'd he have for breakfast?”

Clint's interest seemed purely good-natured, so Steve said, ticking it off on his fingers, “At least four donuts, a piece of pecan pie, a coffee milkshake, a glass of orange juice, a Coke, three fried eggs, biscuits and gravy, ham, bacon, sausage, chorizo hash, and a piece of Nat's toast.”

Clint was watching him as he spoke, and when Steve finished, he said, sounding delighted, “You like it.”

“I what?” Steve said, feeling his face go up in flames. 

“It's not my thing, personally, but I gotta admit he looks pretty cute like this,” said Clint, and then, as if he hadn't just blown the top off Steve's deepest darkest secret, “Hang on. Let's do an experiment.”

Steve waited, intrigue slowly overcoming his embarrassment, as Clint darted into the kitchen and came back a minute later with a big piece of banana cream pie quivering on a plate. “Sam's mom made it,” he said, and sat next to Bucky on the couch. “Bucky,” he said, tickling Bucky's fat side as Steve nearly choked on his jealousy, as he did anytime someone touched Bucky. “C'mon, wakey wakey.”

“Hunh?” Bucky said, blinking open his eyes and looking around muzzily. 

“Sam's mom sent over this pie,” Clint said, holding up the plate. “For you. Here you go.”

“Oh,” Bucky said, “Yum,” and struggled into a sitting position. He put the plate on his lap, which meant he had to lean over his belly to get to it, the position making him look impossibly bigger, and he sighed heavily as he chewed. When he was finished he handed the plate back and said, “Tell Mrs. Wilson I said thank you,” then snuggled back into the couch, letting out a few low, painful-sounding belches. 

“He's a bottomless pit,” Clint declared proudly. “It's been scientifically proven.”

“Can't argue with science,” Steve said, a little dizzy from suppressed arousal. 

“Can't argue with pie,” Bucky said dreamily, and Clint and Steve cracked up.

:::

Bucky knew his eating was out of control. 

He literally could not control himself: if there was food around, he wanted to be eating it, and he'd lost all sense of moderation. It was normal to eat a pint of ice cream before breakfast, right? Normal to put down an entire pizza just two hours after dinner, and normal to order two full meals when you went out to eat. Normal to be so in the habit of stuffing yourself that you had to keep candy bars by your bed for when you woke up in the middle of the night with your stomach growling. 

He knew people watched him, astonished, when he ate three cheeseburgers at the dining hall and went back for a BLT, knew they watched in class when he ate bags of chips and stacks of peanut butter cups and sticks of beef jerkey, and he watched himself sometimes, too, out-of-body almost.

Was that really him, the guy who ate all that? The guy whose ass didn't fit in his chairs anymore, the guy whose belly brushed the table when he sat down, the guy who got winded after climbing one flight of stairs, who was outgrowing clothes like it was his job, who couldn't really sleep on his back anymore because his tummy was getting too heavy?

The guy who fucking loved every single second of it?

April was rainy and cold, and there wasn't much to do except lay around and eat and jerk off to thoughts of the new star quarterback, which is mostly what Bucky did when he wasn't hanging in the art department with Nat and the star quarterback. By the time he weighed himself in late May he was up to 296, which meant he'd put on 96 fucking pounds in 9 fucking months, and lately he could feel every single one of those pounds acutely. He could feel himself getting fatter and fatter, could feel how his body was changing from one day to the next, a feeling that was most noticeable in the mornings when he woke up. 

He'd always been a back sleeper but his tummy had grown too heavy for that, so he woke up on his side now, his belly piled next to him in the bed, and he groaned as he hiked himself onto his elbows and sat up against the headboard, blankets pooling around the dome of his gut like water around an island. He usually took a sleepy moment or two to just sit there in bed, running his hands across that unfamiliar expanse of soft skin, still bloated and gassy from whatever he'd eaten the night before, his whole body feeling tight and swollen and heavy. He thumbed his wide bellybutton, tucked a hand beneath his fat lower belly where it was sitting on his lap, squeezed his pudgy round tits. 

Then he'd work his legs over the side of the bed and push himself to his feet, feeling the pull of his big gut and knowing how his back would ache by the end of the day. He'd pick his boxers out from the crack of his fat ass and head over to his dresser, his thighs rubbing uncomfortably as he walked, and then he'd go through the tiring process of seeing what fit that day. 

This particular morning he managed to cram himself into a pair of newish jeans and a too-small t-shirt covered by an XXL Avengers sweatshirt, the pocket stretched tight over the bloated mound of his tummy, and then he plopped back onto the bed to put on his shoes and socks. Bending over was getting more and more annoying, too much belly in the way, and he found himself panting a little by the time he was done. 

Mornings were for reacclimating to how fat he'd let himself get. 

And for breakfast, of course.

It was a game day, the last of the season, and Steve was cooking the team breakfast downstairs. Bucky could smell bacon even from two floors up, and his stomach began to growl audibly. His shoulder was aching so he popped some Advil and went back and forth about whether to shave or not. He didn't want a beard, exactly, but he was feeling kind of self-conscious about how chubby his face was getting, and how there was absolutely no hiding the soft squish of his little double chin. He decided to let his five o'clock shadow grow to a ten o'clock shadow, mostly because he didn't want to waste time shaving when he could be eating bacon. 

He thudded down the stairs and into the kitchen, where Steve was looking adorably flustered in a pink flour-dusted apron that was tied neatly around his perfect waist, and Bucky's mouth began to water – whether at the sight of Steve all cute and hassled and cooking, or at the sight of the coffee cake he'd just pulled out of the oven, Bucky didn't know.

“Can I help?” Bucky said. 

“You can start bringing these plates into the dining room,” Steve said, and Bucky picked up the coffee cake and a huge plate of bacon, took them into the next room where most of the team had already assembled. There was already a ton of food on the table: two casserole dishes of Steve's famous cheesy egg bake, several platters of pancakes, fruit salad, yogurt, breakfast potatoes, loaves of homemade bread, and some stuff not cooked by Steve – a couple boxes of Dunkin donuts, an assortment of pastries from the bakery down the street. 

Steve came in a moment later bearing a big crockpot of oatmeal, fragrant with apples and spices, and everyone broke into a cheer. Steve ducked his head in his shy way and waved them off, but he was beaming and pink.

“A toast!” roared Thor, raising his coffee mug. “A toast to Steve Rogers: chef, quarterback, and cherished companion! HEAR HEAR!”

The team shouted their approval, and everyone settled down to eat. Bucky found himself sandwiched between Sam and Clint, with Steve across from him, still flushed with pleased embarrassment, and Bucky gave him a wink before reaching for the bacon. 

“Some of us need energy for a game,” Sam said, watching Bucky help himself to two jelly donuts. “What's your excuse?”

“I need energy to watch you assholes fumble your way to the championship,” Bucky said, used to being teased. 

“Here,” Sam said, cutting an obscenely large piece of coffeecake and depositing it on Bucky's plate. “We can't have our best cheerleader fainting mid-game.”

“Yeah,” chimed Clint, and dropped a chocolate croissant on his plate. “Gotta carb-load.”

“Let's get you some bread,” Sam agreed, and started slathering butter on thick slice. 

“Potatoes!” called Thor, and the potatoes were passed down the table so Clint could put a giant spoonful on Bucky's plate. 

“Pancakes!” someone else said, and suddenly there was a plate of pancakes smothered in butter and syrup at Bucky's elbow. 

“There are chocolate chip muffins,” Steve said, and held one out.

“My plate's full,” Bucky complained, but found himself with muffin in hand, because he couldn't say no to Steve Rogers. He ate the muffin quickly, then polished off the stack of pancakes, then ate one of his donuts and started in on the breakfast potatoes. 

“Protein,” Sam advised, as soon as Bucky'd cleared a decent sized gap on his plate, and he filled the space with cheesy eggs and more bacon. Bucky loaded his slice of bread with eggs and finished it off, then began eating his second donut. He was starting to get full, but the donut went down pretty easily and he sighed a little when it was done, his belly bloated back to that tight ache he was so used to, his sweatshirt suddenly too hot. He arched his back, trying to lift his warm belly off his lap a little to cool himself down a little, but he was too big, now, and his tummy stayed on his thighs. He could feel the waistband of his pants digging into the flabby undercurve, and he wished he could unbutton his pants before starting in on that enormous piece of coffeecake. 

He still had the cake, a croissant, and a few bites of potatoes left, and as he was lifting a forkful of cake to his lips someone said, “Give Barnes this last donut,” and suddenly there was a fat cream-filled donut being placed on his plate.

“I've already had two,” Bucky said, mouth full of cake, and he swallowed thickly. “I'm kinda full, boys.” He couldn't help but steal a glance at Steve while he said it, and Steve was looking right at him. 

“You don't pack on that much weight by stopping when you're full,” Steve said quietly. “What would Sam's mama say?”

“She'd say I got fucking fat,” Bucky said, through another mouthful of cake.

“And then she'd give you more pancakes,” Sam said, and plopped another big stack of pancakes on Bucky's syrup-smeared pancake plate. 

“Sam,” Bucky protested weakly, as Sam cut off some hunks of butter and doused the pancakes with syrup. He pushed the last bite of coffeecake into his mouth and swallowed it with a gulp of milk, then reached down to soothe his belly, which was starting to gurgle. To his embarrassment, his sweatshirt had ridden up without his realizing it, and the fat undercurve of his gut was on full display, stretchmarks and all. He tugged the sweatshirt down and pressed his palm into his full stomach, eyeing the donut, croissant and pancakes still left on his plate. “I'm not gonna be able to get up,” he said, taking a resigned bite of pancakes. 

It was a lot, even for him, this early in the day. Three donuts, one croissant, one muffin, two plates of pancakes, at least 10 rashers of bacon, bread, eggs, potatoes, a huge piece of coffeecake, plus several glasses of ice-cold whole milk. It got more and more uncomfortable to lean over his aching belly, and he spread his legs a little to give it more room, feeling it bloat out between his thighs, his breath coming in quick puffs of air. 

When he'd finished, he sat back in his chair, his sweatshirt ridden up the crest of his belly again, and he tugged it down tiredly. 

“Still got some room in there?” Clint said, patting his tummy with a firm hand. 

“No,” Bucky said, pouting, though secretly he was loving every second. 

“C'mon, tubby,” Sam said. “I know you're still hungry. Steve, doesn't he look hungry?”

Steve stared at Bucky for a long, long while, long enough for Bucky's dick to respond, twitching in his tight pants. Finally he said, “He looks like he needs more coffeecake.”

“Steve made this coffeecake just for the team,” Clint said, and levered another vast slice onto Bucky's plate. “You can't make him feel bad by not eating it.”

“I'm fucking full,” Bucky said. “I can barely breathe.” 

But of course, he ate it. And he ate more bacon, too, and let them give him the last chocolate chip muffin, and he drank another glass of milk, and ate another slice of heavily-buttered bread, and, to hell with it, finished off the rest of the bacon entirely. He was moaning a little by the time he was done, shameless in his discomfort, his belly almost hard to the touch and so heavy he felt pinned down by it.

“For good luck,” Sam said, and rubbed his belly, and then Clint followed suite, and suddenly Bucky was inundated with a line of football players all trying to get their hands on his swollen gut, and Thor was shouting, “Our good luck charm! Our good luck Buck!”  
and honestly it felt too good to protest, and he was so stuffed he could barely speak anyway, so he just sat there and let it happen, weighed down by his enormous breakfast and the unbendable dome of his throbbing tummy. 

Steve, however, didn't move. He simply watched, perfectly still, as if he were rooted to his chair, and Bucky longed for him to get up and lay a hand on him like the others were doing, but he didn't. 

Finally the team drifted away to wash the dishes and put the food away, and Bucky and Steve were alone at the table. 

“You gonna make it to the game?” Steve asked. 

“I don't, know,” puffed Bucky. “You might have, to roll me. Jesus christ, I'm full. I feel fucking huge.”

He wanted Steve to respond to that; wanted Steve to say something like, You look fucking huge, but Steve was silent. And Bucky somehow found the courage to say, “You didn't get any luck.”

Steve was quiet, then he said, “You think I need some?”

“Yeah,” Bucky said, and Steve got up from the table and came around to where Bucky sat, stuffed and breathing hard. Steve crouched down beside Bucky's chair, strangely gentlemanly, and hovered a palm over Bucky's round belly, but then stopped. He bit his lip, his eyes huge, pupils blown, and Bucky said, his voice rough, “Touch me, Steve.”

“You want me to?” Steve said, and Bucky knew what he was really asking.

“I really, really, really want you to,” said Bucky, heart hammering like crazy, and then Steve's big warm palm was splayed over Bucky's painfully full stomach, Steve's strong fingers digging in, his thumb circling Bucky's stretched navel, and Bucky raised his own hand and placed it over Steve's. They stayed like that for a moment, neither of them daring to move, and then Steve let out a breathy little laugh.

“God,” he said, his voice shaky.

“I'm too full to lean over,” Bucky said. “So you're gonna have to make the move.”

And Steve did. He bent over Bucky and kissed him, his lips soft and strong and sweet and perfect, and Bucky moaned into his mouth. Steve ran his fingers over Bucky's cheeks and then passed a hand over his belly again, cupping the fat lower curve of it, hefting it and squeezing as his kiss grew deeper, rougher, and Bucky's whole body felt racked with sensation, pain and pleasure, fullness and arousal, a desperate yearning for more even as his stomach groaned from excess. 

Only when Thor whooped from the doorway did they break apart, both of them flushed and panting, Bucky's belly heaving, his sweatshirt rucked up again, his hair a mess. 

“At long last!” Thor said, pumping his fist. “There is no chance now of losing this game!”

“Thor,” Bucky said, too happy to be embarrassed, “Your logic is questionable.”

“You will see,” Thor said, shaking an enormous finger in their direction. “You will see, when we win the playoffs today!”

Whether or not Bucky and Steve had anything to do with it, the Avengers did win the playoffs. They won 54 to 19, and even Natasha screamed with delight, hollering and clapping along with the rest of the crowd while Bucky struggled heavily to his feet, his eyes seeking Steve's on the playing field. 

“There,” Natasha pointed, and when Bucky turned to look, Steve blew him a kiss, beaming like the sun.

There was an epic party at the football house that night, but Steve and Bucky were not in attendance. They were in Steve's bedroom, on Steve's bed, engaging in the most blazingly hot foreplay Bucky had ever experienced. 

“You're doing great, Buck,” Steve said, and gazed up at him from under his long eyelashes. He was between Bucky's thighs, and Bucky was between a pepperoni pizza and a chocolate cake. “The pizza's almost gone, you're almost there.”

“Fuck, Stevie,” Bucky panted. His belly was covered in crumbs and smears of sauce from the meatball sub he'd eaten before starting on the pizza, and he could barely see Steve over the swell of it. “I don't think I can – ah –” He briefly lost the power of speech as Steve's mouth closed around his cock again, and he didn't protest when Steve came back up and worked a huge bite of chocolate cake between Bucky's lips. He followed the cake with a messy kiss, then disappeared again over the slope of Bucky's belly. “Feel like I'm gonna pop,” Bucky moaned.

“You keep going, and I'll keep going,” Steve said. “That was the deal.”

“I hate you,” Bucky gasped.

“No you don't,” said Steve. “You love me.”

“So what if I do?” Bucky said. 

“Eat your pizza,” said Steve, and Bucky did.

:::

After graduation, Steve and Bucky moved into a place on a quiet, sunny, tree-lined street that was close to the high school where Steve was teaching summer art classes, and close to their alma mater, where Bucky was doing research for a former professor. Bucky's shoulder still ached sometimes, but only in damp weather, and the pain only served as a reminder: he'd been so convinced his life was over, but in fact, his injury marked the start of his new life, a better life. So when he woke up the morning of the anniversary of his accident, he woke up full of gratitude – and still full from the lasagna Steve had cooked the night before. 

Steve's side of the bed was empty – he was probably on one of his morning runs – but there was a still-warm cup of coffee waiting on the nightstand, and Bucky hoisted himself up to reach for it. His belly gave a low rumble, a little tender to the touch, and Bucky patted it gingerly, rocking from side to side as he spread his legs to let it swell out between them. He sipped his coffee, one hand scratching at his chest, and he paused to cup one of his pecs – they were so fat and round, now, resting on his belly like a pair of tits, and Steve loved to play with them, to bite and suck them. 

As if Bucky's thoughts of Steve had conjured him, the bedroom door opened, and Steve came in with a steaming tray. He paused for a moment, staring at Bucky's hand on his own chest, and then moved forward to sit on the edge of the bed. He put the tray on the nightstand and kissed Bucky, his hand going to the side of Bucky's gut, then squeezing the roll of fat at his hips. 

“Morning,” he said. “I made you a chicken pot pie.”

“Smells amazing,” Bucky said, looking at the tray. The pie was golden and oozing, still hot from the oven, and there was a plate of sausages beside it and what looked like a chocolate milkshake. It gave Steve a kick to see Bucky start off his day with non-breakfast foods, for some reason, and Bucky didn't mind indulging him. 

Steve liked challenging Bucky, liked pushing him right to the edge of his limits and sometimes past them, and Bucky wasn't surprised when Steve said, “Milkshake first, there's more in the blender.”

The ice cream was so cold and sweet on Bucky's morning tongue that he gasped a little, but he got used to it pretty quickly, and he drank it pretty quickly under Steve's sharp eye. When he was finished, he handed back the glass, and Steve disappeared to refill it, leaving Bucky to start in on the pie. It was magnificent, perfectly-cooked, the gravy buttery and thick, the chicken tender, the crust flaky with lard. He'd made a pretty good dent in it when Steve reappeared with another milkshake, and he paused to eat a couple sausage links. When half the pie was gone he had to sit back a little, belly getting tight, and Steve picked up the pie tin and fed him for a while, until Bucky had to push the tin away and catch his breath. He drank his second milkshake while he waited for his stomach to settle, then finished the sausages, then tried to work up some burps for relief, but only succeeded in giving himself a very painful case of the hiccups. Then he finished the pie, Steve gave him a blowjob, he jerked Steve off, and he went back to sleep.

This was his life now. He was the luckiest guy on earth.

When he woke up for the second time, it was midday, and his belly was still taut and gurgly, but it wasn't aching so much any more, and he could take deep breaths again. He helped himself to the Tums he always kept by the bed, and finally began working his way upright. It was harder than it had been even a month ago, when he'd passed 300 pounds, in part because his center of gravity had shifted in ways he didn't quite understand yet. Living with Steve had him packing on the weight at a speed he could scarcely believe, and he'd put on twenty pounds just since the beginning of June. Lugging around a 324 pound belly was harder than he would've guessed it to be, probably not helped by the fact that the most exercise he got was walking to his car and back. 

He was out of shape in ways he'd never dreamed he could be; so out of shape that it was actually kind of difficult to hoist himself out of their low bed. He had to rock a bit to get enough momentum, belly gurgling unhappily as he moved it around, and when he was upright he took a moment to get his balance. Putting on over 100 pounds in a year was disorienting, and being so fucking full all the time was tiring, his belly always so tender and stuffed. 

He squeezed himself into a pair of basketball shorts that strained over his chunky ass, and tugged on a new t-shirt that was only a little bit snug. When he looked in the mirror he was, as always, surprised to see he didn't look nearly as fat as he felt, though he was undoubtedly fat: his belly jutted out in front of him dramatically with his deep bellybutton outlined through his t-shirt, and even stubble couldn't hide how round his face had grown. He was getting pretty wide, too, his hips blubbering out over his basketball shorts, his back with its deep roll at his waist and another little one under his arms, but he wasn't, like, fat, fat.

“Definitely not,” Steve said, when Bucky told him this a few minutes later, in the kitchen. “You're wasting away. Here.” He went to the fridge and found a canister of whipped cream. Bucky squirted some into his mouth, licking his lips, and laid a hand on his belly. 

“I feel fucking huge,” Bucky said. 

“It's cause you put on so much weight so quickly,” Steve said. “You'll get used to it.”

“Not if I keep going at this rate,” Bucky said, and ate some more whipped cream. 

“What rate?” Steve said innocently, and the oven let out a ding. “Your lunch is ready.”

Lunch was a cookie sheet of nachos, piled high and dripping with cheese and sour cream, and afterwards he and Steve sat out on the porch and drank beer while he digested.

“If I start looking really fat,” Bucky said, “you'll tell me, right?”

Steve just laughed and handed him another beer. 

:::

“Steven Rogers,” Natasha said, when she came back to town in early October, a short vacation from her mysterious European job that was definitely not spying. “Your boyfriend got seriously fat.”

“Did he?” said Steve wickedly. “I hadn't noticed.”

Nat shook her head. “I knew you had a dirty secret. I've done some kinky shit, but you two take the cake. Literally.”

They were sitting at a picnic table in the backyard at a party at Thor's new house, which he was sharing, of course, with Clint and Sam, and Bucky was wedged into a deck chair, resting a bottle of his beer on his belly. Steve tried to see Bucky through Natasha's eyes: the new roll of pudge at his neck, his chubby hands, the way his belly now completely overlapped his waistband even when he was standing, a doughy inch or two visible beneath his too-small shirt. His sides bulged out over the armrests of the chair. Thor appeared with another beer for him, and reached down to give his belly a firm shake, and Steve saw just how much it jiggled now, even when it was full, and how his tits jiggled too. 

“I guess that extra fifty pounds is showing,” Steve said.

“Fifty since when?” said Nat.

“Since we moved in together,” Steve said, unable to contain his pride. 

“That was only four months ago.”

“He was hungry,” Steve said, shrugging, and Nat let out a disbelieving laugh.

“So what's he at?” she asked.

“About 365, give or take a few pounds,” Steve said. As if Bucky knew they were discussing him, he looked up, and his eyes found Steve's. He said something to Thor, then slapped his free hand down onto the armrest and tried to hoist himself up out of the chair, but he was pretty firmly wedged in, and it took another attempt until he was upright and moving towards Steve and Nat. 

“He's waddling,” said Nat.

“Nah,” said Steve, grinning as Bucky approached. He reached up and laid a hand on the side of Bucky's tummy and gave it a fond pat. It still gave him such a thrill to know that he was allowed to touch Bucky like this; to know that he was partially responsible for how big this belly was getting, for the new overhang, for how fat his lower back had gotten and how puffy and swollen his tits were. “Hey.”

“Hey yourself,” said Bucky, and leaned down to kiss him, his belly squishing against his thighs as he bent over. “There room for one more on this bench?”

“I think you count as two more,” Natasha said.

“Only if we're talking scrawny little chicks like you,” Bucky said, and eased himself down between them, hands on his thighs as he lowered himself down. He stretched, resettling his belly on his lap, and put a hand on it comfortably. “Did you guys try the cheese dip? It's out of this world.”

Steve passed him a plate of chocolate chip cookies, and Bucky took a big stack of them and began pushing them into his mouth. “Nat,” Bucky said around a mouthful, “pass me those steak shiskebabs? Thanks. Hey, what're you doing tomorrow? Wanna get brunch?”

“Sure,” she said. “If you guys don't mind stopping at the art store with me afterwards.”

“I need some vellum anyway,” Steve said, watching Bucky chew the steak. 

Sam came over, then, with an overcrowded paper plate holding three slices of pie. “French silk, banana, and coconut cream,” he said. “My mom's recipes. Barnes, you think this'll stay on that gut of yours? I want to take a picture for her.”

“I don't know,” Bucky said, but he leaned back against the table so Sam could balance the plate on the firm upper crest of his belly, and a minute later Sam was snapping photos with his iPhone. “Am I done?” Bucky wanted to know. “Can I eat these now?”

“Go ahead,” Sam said, typing busily. 

Bucky didn't bother taking the plate off his stomach, just steadied it with one hand and began to fork big bites with the other. “Thanks,” he said.

“My mother says you look like you're 9 months along,” Sam said. “She wants to know if it's Steve's.”

“It sure is,” Bucky said, and his belly quivered as he chuckled. “But if you want to be the godfather, you can bring me another beer. And maybe some of that cheese dip with a handful of corn chips.”

“Only for you, good luck Buck,” Sam said, and rubbed the side of Bucky's gut. 

Steve and Bucky walked home later that evening, four blocks in the warm twilight, holding hands. Steve could hear Bucky's heavy breathing, rhythmic and reliable, and he said, “You tired, baby?”

“No,” Bucky said, clearly a little winded. “Just fat. Ugh, Steve. This thing is heavy.”

“Want me to carry you?”

Bucky snorted. “You would if I asked, wouldn't you.”

“Of course,” Steve said honestly. “I'd do anything for you, Buck.”

“Will you watch Iron Chef with me tonight?”

Steve rolled his eyes. The only cooking show he could stand to watch was the Great British Bakeoff – they were all so nice to one another, unlike the American cooking shows, that took all the kindness and fun out of making delicious food, and turned it into a bloody spectator sport. Don't get him started. But he said, “Two episodes. That's it.”

Five episodes later, Bucky was sticky from a tub of cookie dough ice cream, and Steve was pulling a family pack of frozen chicken nuggets out of the oven. He put together a bowl of ranch and a bowl of barbecue sauce and brought the tray out to Bucky. He took a moment to admire him: he was lying on his side on the couch, propped up on pillows, one hand tucked between the overhang of his belly and the other rubbing firm circles on the stretched-out skin. “Full?” Steve said.

“I ate a lot at that party,” Bucky said with a burp.

“I know,” he said, and set the chicken nuggets down on the table, then pushed it closer so Bucky could reach them without getting up. “You want another beer?”

“Please,” Bucky said, and belched again. 

When Steve came back into the living room, Bucky was still curled around his full belly, lips greasy from the chicken nuggets. 

“I feel really fat, Stevie,” he said. 

“You look really fat,” Steve admitted. 

“Yeah?” Bucky struggled upright, grunting as he worked himself into a cross-legged position. His belly pooled in his lap, so thick and round and doughy that Steve just had to touch it. He sank down next to Bucky on the couch, pressed up against his soft shoulder, and began petting him, gripping fistfulls of pudge now and then, just because he could. “I can't even lean over this thing far enough to get those nuggets,” Bucky said. “Look.” He demonstrated, trying to maneuver around his belly, red-faced. 

“Good thing I'm here,” Steve said, leaning over easily. 

“I've gotten so fucking lazy,” Bucky said, letting Steve push a nugget between his lips. “So fucking fat and lazy.”

“Yeah, you have,” Steve said, and fed him another chicken nugget. “Here, just sit back. Let me do the work.”

Obediently, Bucky slumped back, pressing his belly and wincing. He burped heavily just as Steve put another nugget in his mouth. “Feel so big,” he murmured. “Can't get fucking comfortable. You have no idea what it's like, Steve. No idea what it's like to lug this around all day, to be so fucking full all the time. Haven't seen my dick in months, can't go up the stairs without needing to catch my breath, can barely put my shoes on anymore. I'm gonna need loafers, Steve. Fucking loafers.”

“Do you like it?” Steve said.

“I love it,” Bucky said. “I look down at this gut and think of you.”

“You don't wish you were still 190 pounds, stacked with muscle, playing football?”

Bucky laughed breathlessly. “Fuck, no.”

“Good,” Steve said, and nibbled a little on Bucky's pudgy jaw. “Me neither. Here, if you want to take these chicken nuggets, I'll rub your belly while you eat.”

“Teamwork,” said Bucky, smiling. “My favorite.”


End file.
